


Vigil

by QueenIX



Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: F/M, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-01
Updated: 2014-06-01
Packaged: 2018-01-27 21:11:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,413
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1722689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QueenIX/pseuds/QueenIX
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Odo keeps watch on his last night with Kira.<br/></p>
            </blockquote>





	Vigil

Nerys has finally fallen asleep. She lays sprawled across my chest, and my arms make a circle around her. Dark hair falls on my neck in a silken spread, and her breasts press warmly against me as she breathes, deeply in and out. The soft pulls of air sigh out on my skin, and I will my cells to hold together, to stay solid for her. One last time, I wanted to give her this. I wanted to hold her through the night as she needs to be held, by someone real, someone of true flesh and bone. Someone nothing like me.

I knew this day was coming. I thought I'd prepared myself for it, but I find, as I hold my beloved against the night, it is not so. How could I have ever thought I'd be prepared to cut out my own heart? For so long, Nerys has been my star, my compass, my guide. My existence has matched its rhythm to hers, and the idea that I'll not be here, that I will no longer stand sentinel for her, is unfathomable. I know I will long for her for the rest of my days, which is a long, long time for one such as I. Nerys and I are, despite our vast differences, two paghs fired from the same source, one thing that was made two, and no matter how far from her I go, I will carry a part of her with me, always.

The twists of fate that brought us together are untenable when I lay them out straight. It's as if the universe knew what it was doing when it dropped me in Bajor's backyard all those years ago. Nerys says it was the will of the Prophets, that I was meant to be found at the cusp of great change, and that her gods ordained our fate. On this, we disagree. I've never been a believer in gods and their capriciousness. Yet our course together has been plotted by a rather coincidental star, and laying with her here cradled in my arms makes me understand why people can have so much faith in the mysterious. Maybe the universe did have a plan when it twined my life with hers.

The universe, however, is cold. It is unaware and unfeeling. We are all of us insignificant things swallowed by the never as time runs it course, and my love and I are no exception. But I do not resent this. It is the order of things, and I do understand order.

Still, it is hard to accept that one's life is not one's own, not wholly. Free beings like to think they control their destiny, but so much is influenced by the unplanned threads that weave themselves into the tapestry of our lives. In the end, the picture we set out to create becomes a strange distortion of the original. I had certainly never planned to leave Nerys, to leave the station and my friends, to leave Odo himself behind. Yet in a matter of hours, that is just what I will do.

My friends believe the Founder coerced me to make the pact with her, that I sacrificed myself on the alter of peace. They would be partially right, but the truth is, I told the Founder I would go before she asked it of me. There was really no choice in it for me from the start. My people are dying, and I am the cure. How can I not go to them, despite all there has been between us? They have used me, exiled me, incarcerated me. They have lied to me more times than I can count. What could I possibly owe them? Yet, they are my people, my only tie to the truth of what I am, and the idea of being the last of my kind because I wanted vengeance holds utterly no appeal.

So, I will go. I will take my knowledge of the solids with me. My people need to see what they've done with their misplaced hatred. The universe itself has shuddered at the loss of life their war has caused. This kind of tragedy cannot be repeated, and if my sacrifice, and Kira's, can be used to redeem those losses, if it can keep anything like this from happening again, then our love is a small price to pay.

Nerys stirs. She does not agree, and these thoughts disturb her rest. Connected as we are, flesh to flesh, I know she can feel what I'm thinking. I stroke her hair and kiss her brow, soothing her back to sleep.

For all the talking my love and I have done, we've always spoken clearest without words. When I told her I was leaving, I heard everything she never said. She didn't tell me she was heartbroken, didn't argue with me over my decision. She never spoke of her lack of faith in my people, or their ability to keep their word. She didn't have to. I heard. It was uttered in the paleness of her cheek, in the wilt of her shoulders. It was declared in the way she drowned herself in duty after we returned to the station. Her silence when we did manage to be together spoke volumes.

Still, I have not changed my mind. Our lovemaking tonight said whatever was left to say, tender-sweet and longing at first, but becoming desperate, fevered, angry even, as the night slipped away from us. With the sharp rake of her nails, with her digging grasp and the snag of her teeth, she drove my desire to a tortured frenzy, telling me all the things she wouldn't say, asking the questions I knew were there. I did my best to answer them, but I couldn't tell her the one thing she wanted most to hear.

I cannot stay with Nerys, no matter how much I love her. It would be unfair to both of us, and it has taken me this long to see it. I cannot give her the things she wants, things she should want, and deserves to have. She is the reason I made the bargain I did so readily. I cannot grow old with her. I cannot give her children. She cannot give me the Link, not fully, no matter how much she loves me, and denial will not change the truth for either of us. For both our sakes, we must be parted. The universe is truly not kind.

The Founder, as I linked with her on Cardassia, latched onto my realization, and gloated over my despair. She had told me so, she said, had been trying to tell me all along, and I could have been spared this pain if I'd listened. I hate to say it, but she is right. Those things about balance and clarity the Founder has tried to explain to me finally make sense. I am a Changeling. I was never meant to live this way- solid, still, contained. My matrix has roiled and raged against this self-inflicted confinement for far too long. My need for the Link, for the healing it can bring, has become undeniable. I must go home if I am to survive.

A pained sound comes from my love, and it brings me back to her. Her brow is troubled. Her body jerks and trembles with the disquiet of her dreams. Gently, I let the hand on her back relax to its natural form. As I meld with her skin, the crease in her brow fades, replaced by a small, contented smile. I close my eyes, and smile myself. I can feel her life force, feel  _her,_ as the electric pulses of her body arc the blissful currents that sync us. Until Nerys, I never thought to be with a solid like this. It is not as it is with a member of my own race, it is not enough to let me stay here, but it has none the less been a precious gift. I never expected to share my true self with her at all.

I will have to wake her soon. We haven't much time left, but for a little longer, I can lay here, linked with my love. I can finish this vigil, and be at peace. And I can pretend, as the voice of the universe is shut out by the walls of the station, we don't have to listen.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Based on characters belonging to Paramount. The characters are theirs, the story is mine.


End file.
